The Best of American Small-Batch

Randall Made knives

In 1938 almost all knives in America were mass-produced. Bo Randall changed that. Insane waiting list.

Grillworks wood grills

This is 250 pounds of high-grade stainless steel fashioned into the best backyard meat-searing machine extant, complete with an aluminum crank wheel for raising and lowering the cooking surface over wood or coals, a firebrick back to retain heat, and V-shaped grates that channel precious steak drippings into a basting pan. But let's be honest: You were sold at "crank wheel."

Hess Surfboards

Plenty of surfers have an environmentalist bent—which is funny, because most surfboards are shaped from toxic polyurethane blanks that wind up in landfills after a few years of hard use. Danny Hess does things differently: His boards are crafted from wood and entirely by hand, three blocks from the best surf break in San Francisco. They look like something you'd hang up and never touch, but they ride like nothing else.

Best Made maple syrup

Sorry, Canada. We do it better. And this bottle brings some much needed attitude to your breakfast nook.

WhistlePig rye

Here's an American story for you. A first-generation Indian-Irish kid named Raj Bhakta is born in Philadelphia, cradle of liberty. Prep school, Boston College, investment banking, clownish stint on The Apprentice, a run for Congress that we won't dignify by describing. Act two: Follows in the footsteps of George Washington, noted rye distiller in his day, and enlists master distiller Dave Pickerell to craft the best rye whiskey we've ever tasted from grain grown on a single Vermont farm.

Parts + Labor Workshop furniture

A year ago, two Brooklyn guys by the names of Craig Montoro and Bryan Mesenbourg quit their jobs to become modern-day Shakers, guided by the same semispiritual reverence for the raw elegance of wood (but not so much the whole "no sex allowed" thing). Their minimalist, unexpectedly ergonomic chair is shown here in walnut and ash, but you can order one in whatever wood you want. You just can't ask for it by name, since it doesn't have one. "I guess we could call it Chair Number One," says Montoro.

Cold Spring Apothecary bug spray

Unlike the mass-manufactured stuff, this cedary bug spray wards off critters while smelling like Woodstock, not a Pennzoil rig.

Vanilla bicycles

You don't need a drawer full of padded Lycra shorts to appreciate the obsessively detailed artistry of Portland, Oregon, custom bike builder Sacha White. But if you want it for your own, you'll have to be patient: Vanilla has a five-year wait list.

Hamilton 1883 shirts line

If you subscribe to the theory that practice makes perfect, then you understand why Hamilton's button-fronts, "hand-cut and sewn in Houston for 129 years," represent the platonic ideal of shirts. Case in point, this Flanelina button-down, with a trim-but-not-tight fit and an azure blue that makes your average oord literally pale in comparison.

Newsom's country hams

Try Newsom's hams and you'll feel chumped for the $300 you spent on Serrano last year. Nancy Newsom is the master of weather-aged American hams, a tradition most people don't even remember. Order early, and don't get discouraged when she tells you it might be a year before you get one. It's worth it.—Ben Turley

OMA Monarch speakers

Jonathan Weiss founded Oswalds Mill Audio in 2006 because, as he puts it, "the audio industry makes shit now." From an old German mill in Pennsylvania, he and his team channel the golden age of hi-fi by way of slate-topped turntables, creamy tube amps, and sculptural speakers like the six-foot-tall Monarchs. What you hear from the dual fifteen-inch woofers and cast-aluminum horn isn't so much beautiful music as it is a minor epiphany.

...and the Big-Ass Batch

We produce 650 million bottles of Heinz ketchup a year, and every friggin' one of them is perfect.